Glass bead scrimmage…

This is the pendant that started it all. I’ve been messing around with many of the elements for some time…the transparent on white, the fritted base, the shape, etc but the colors in this one clicked for me. Finally.

I was listening to an interview with David Crowder and he said ‘songwriting [insert any designing phase in art work] is elusive…I never feel very clever at all when I’m in it.’ How true is that? I play and come up with a buncha’ stuff and flounder around until I hit on something I like. I don’t necessarily love it but there is something there to be honed and uncovered. But once you find the like, you can get to the love. The first layer is peeled.

So often I stop at this point and continue making more and more of the same thing (as with yesterday’s experiements). But this time I am compelled to push further…deeper into it. Refine the techniques. Refine the color combinations and balance. Refine the shape. Right now something is missing. There isn’t enough separation of the elements. While I’m loving how the colors work together, the proportions are just off. The aqua and orange are too bold while the thin stripes of orange are too timid.

But there’s something in there, don’t you think? My dream for this creative exercise is to go beyond my current level of work. Every once in a while I feel like I’ve taken a leap. That in the matter of one overnight something happens and I feel ten times better at what I do than the day before. I love that phenomenon and it hasn’t happened on a grand scale in a long time.

I’m also trying to soak up and take in all of this bright color stuff because as the seasons change, so do color desires and I could be back to earth tones again tommorrow.

Oh, and why scrimmage? It just popped into my head. I knew what it was but I knew these have nothing to do with sports practice. So I looked it up and interestingly enough part of the definition is: ‘a confused struggle or a fight…engage in a simulated game.’ That can work. So, scrimmage beads they are.